SD
I, Hopefulpilgrim, wrote: If one takes this statement ("This is My body") literally, one would have to take all other metaphors He employed literally also.
SoothingDave wrote: You have simply started with a fallacy. We use our judgment to determine what is literal and what is figurative. You are saying that we are not allowed to discern, we must accept everything as literal or everything as figurative. I suppose this includes the stories about the Resurrection as well.
First of all, you are right---the way in which I worded it DID make the statement fallacious. Let me try it again: If one takes this statement ("This is My body") literally, other OBVIOUS metaphors could also be taken literally, such as "I am the Vine; you are the branches." (Well, I'm not sure how much better that is, but I hope you understand my gist.)
Thank you for recognizing the fallacy, when pointed out. Now, on we go. This amended statement of yours hinges on the word "obvious." To you, Jesus at the Last Supper is obviously speaking metaphorically. Not so to me. That was kind of my entire point -- discerning which things to take literally and which figuratively and which both and neither is the task of making sense of Scripture. It's what we are discussing here.
Second, I thought y'all couldn't use common discernment when reading the scriptures.
Says who? We are certainly free to use any of the intellectual tools Our Lord gave us. What we should not do is use our own reading to develop heretical doctrine.
You also wrote: ...in order to puzzle out what he meant when he used metaphors like "I and the Father are one" and "He who has seen me has seen the Father"
Why do you call these metaphors? I see these as statements of fact.
That's my point. What I may see as metaphors, you see as strightforward fact. And vice versa. (In this case I am playing devil's advocate, but I have seen confused folks read those statments metaphorically.)
SD
One of the biggest non-issues that I see in Catholic/Protestant debate is the labeling of Mary as the "Mother of God."
As far as I can tell, Catholics and Protestants hold nearly the exact same view on this subject, they just differ in the terms they use to describe it.
"Jesus is fully man and fully God; Mary gave birth to Jesus (she is his mother); Mary is the mother of God."
No Catholic believes that Mary existed before Jesus. I don't understand the debate.
The illusory world of the Matrix is the world of the fallen passions, which ultimately are unreal, though real enough to kill you (spiritually).
I wrote: I reject a metaphorical understanding of John 6 in particular and the Eucharist in general because, in the Bible, to eat a person's flesh and drink his blood in a metaphorical sense means to persecute him in a bloody manner and to destroy him.
Your response: Not always, dignan. For instance, does "O taste and see that the Lord is good!" mean that we are persecuting or killing the Lord? (or perhaps you employ this verse as a eucharistic blessing?) There are some other instances in the Word which don't agree with your rule, but I can't think of even one at the moment. (I took an Ambien a while ago) Help me out, Protties!
I respond: Sorry, but "Eat my flesh" is a very specific idiom and your "O taste and see..." example doesn't fit the mold of the "eat my flesh" idiom at all.
I wrote: I also reject a metaphorical understanding of John 6 because of the way the listeners of Jesus reacted to His statements...they abondoned Jesus over a gross misunderstanding with possible eternal consequences. My Lord is not that reckless.
Your response: Yes, some of His listeners were offended by Jesus' suggesting that they eat him and drink His blood. But Jesus did correct their thinking when He proclaimed that there is nothing profitable in flesh; rather it is THE SPIRIT who gives life---and the words He had been speaking were of a spiritual nature which would bring life to the hearers...if they believe. They didn't abandon Jesus because they misunderstood; it clearly says that they left because they did not BELIEVE.
I respond: You're right that they did not believe. Both before and after Christ's supposed clarification in verse 63 they couldn't believe what they were hearing. Even the Apostles weren't too sure what the heck the deal was which is evident in Peter's "Lord, to whom shall we go..." in verse 68-69. This event, to my knowledge, was the only time that the Gospels record people who withdrew from following Christ over doctrinal(for lack of a better word) teaching, with eternal consequences no less. Obviously the message you think that Jesus was trying to convey in verse 63(It is the Spirit that gives life... == Don't take this literally) wasn't so clear to the people that abandoned Him. This is important stuff that Jesus said. If He was to be taken metaphorically, wouldn't you think He would exhaust all possibility for further explanation in order to get to message right?
But He didn't do that. He gave a single, somewhat cryptic, in relation to His other past explanations over confusion regarding His teaching, clarification and that was that. He was so sure of His teaching that He risked(insofar as God can risk:)) losing the Apostles.
I wrote: Also, the Greek word used for "eat" is trogo which literally means "to gnaw". Pretty graphic, and dare I say literal, description, if you ask me.
Your response: This doesn't prove anything. Aren't there several Greek words for "eat"? They are all basically the same, Just because "gnaw" is graphic, doesn't mean He was speaking literally. In the figurative sense, "gnaw" is just as graphic!
I respond: There is one more point which I forgot to add. In verse 55 Jesus says, "For my flesh is meat indeed, and my blood is drink indeed."(KJV) while other translations render verse 55 as ""For My flesh is true food, and My blood is true drink.". Regardless, the Greek that is translated as indeed/true is alethos. Strong's concordance gives the definition of alethos as "truly, of a truth, in reality, most certainly".
With that said, it makes no sense for Jesus to say that His Body is true food which we must "gnaw" on in order to have life and be raised on the last day if what He was saying was meant to be taken symbolically or metaphorically. Bread and wine, even if it is symbol of something, has no objective reality beyond its "breadness" and "wineness". It's still just bread and wine so how can a mere symbol give us eternal life? So for Jesus to be speaking symbolically is nonsense. Also, the fact that Jesus basically repeats himself 4 times in verses 53-57 displays the forcefulness of what He is trying to convey.
To use a math analogy(since I'm a perpetual geek) of John 6:53-64:
Jesus: 2+2=4But if you're correct, then Jesus, in verse 63, is saying, "Hey 2+2 doesn't really equal 4. You guys misunderstood."
the Jews: How can 2+2=4?
Jesus: 2+2=4
Jesus: 2+2=4
Jesus: 2+2=4
Jesus: 2+2=4
the Jews: This is some whacked out stuff. Who can believe it?
Jesus: You think that's whack? What if I were to tell you that the integral of x^2 over the interval of 0 to 5 equals 125/3? You must change the way you think in order to believe that 2+2=4.
the Jews: Forget this guy; I'm out of here.
I wrote: due to the fact that the historical understanding and teaching of Christianity is that the Eucharist is literally the Body and Blood of Christ, I reject a symbolic or metaphorical Eucharist.
You responded: OK---please show me the historical record which indicates that the first century Christians really believed in this hocuspocus. Draw the record from the book of Acts or the epistles...or even from Clement or some other early church father's writings in that century.
I respond: I would ask you to show a little bit of respect by not calling the Eucharist, "hocus pocus". The history of the Real Presence of the Eucharist will be on the way shortly. Thank you, in advance, for your patience.
His Flesh is true food and His Blood is true drink.
And pray for JP II
"To: First Conservative
‘Were it not that the Baptists have been grievously tormented and cut off with the knife during the past twelve hundred years they would swarm in greater numbers than all the reformers.' (Roman Catholic Cardinal Stanislaus Hosius, 1504-1579, official representative of the pope and presiding officer of the Council of Trent.)
That quotation is a fraud. But what can we expect when you use The Trail of Blood as your history book.
Baptists are not Reformers
Your(sic) right, in the truest sense of the word they were not Reformers(neither were Luther, Calvin, Zwingli, etc... How can people who fractured the Body of Christ be called Reformers is beyond me). But they all, including the Baptists, have their origins in the Reformation.
97/162 posted on 10/12/01 7:01 AM Pacific by Catholic(sic) dignan3"
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Note: I have reposted your kind, well documented, and thoughtful reply - SARCASM - so that the "Cardinal" Hosius quote can be restated. In copying the tripe of your response to my P77/T162 addressed to allend, I have corrected your "(sic)" marks and deleted your offensive repetitious request for prayer for YOUR spiritual Father, that Polish RC priest you call "Pope."
So, the poster, dignan3, whom I rejected as a heretic on P16/T66 for deceptively using selected, but disputed, quotations to support HIS OPINIONS, who claimed he was departing these threads 08/28/01, T129 because he was going back to school - a "computer science student" (attending Franciscan U.?) - is back spewing his hatred of all non-Roman Catholics. Did he/she wash out of theological school?
By calling the quotation from YOUR "Cardinal" Hosius a fraud, you are claiming he did not make such a statement. Incidentally, your assertion of my reference for that quote is incorrect, although "The Trail of Blood" is a book I would recommend to any seeker of the TRUTH! The source for the quote: Cardinal Stanislaus Hosius, Letters, APUD OPERA, pp 112,113.
Your criticism of the Reformation (note no "sic") is incorrect and unjustified. My reading (not from RC sources, obviously, as is yours) is that the RC priest, Martin Luther, was disgusted and sickened by the dishonesty and immorality of YOUR church - headed by a "Pope" - and was striving to "REFORM" it - the RCC.
Since all Cathlicks(sic), beginning about 250 A.D., came out of the church of Believers which Jesus founded, the church of God of the Scriptures, composed of Believers who were ALL Baptists (critically called anabaptists, "rebaptizers", by their critics since they would not accept infant baptism or baptisms by others), Catholics(sic) like yourself are apostate Baptists! LOL That is why Baptists were not and are not "Reformers" - they were NOT trying to REFORM the apostate Catholic(sic) church, which is NOT, by definition, the "Body of Christ"! The reform of the Roman Catholic Church, YOUR church, was attempted in the 1500s by Luther, Calvin, Zwingli and others and is generally termed by most historians as the REFORMATION!!! Live with it!
Let me state it again - since you have obvious difficulty accepting and comprehending TRUTH - the First Century church, the earliest Body of Christ, the Believers who were called Christians or Nazarenes, observed the ordinance of Baptism as did Jesus - they were BAPTISTS!!!
Flame away, RCs - I know the TRUTH can be difficult for you after the years of brainwashing.
Also, if you think the differences between the Orthodox and the Roman Catholics are so trivial as to be analogized to a "barette", why do you spend so much time arguing against the modern conception of the Papacy?
If you had not stated "An excerpt:", you would be a candidate for the dignan3 "Award for RCC Deception." As it is, your post borders closely on deception - you certainly deceived me. I thought YOU had read all those 277 published letters in Latin of Hosius.
Today, I found the time to visit the website you referenced and learned (to my surprise, SARCASM) that the material you posted was from a RCC! Sean Hyland wrote all those words you pasted (without the benefit of quotes - isn't that a little devious SD?).
So, my comments in #412 and #422 stand. Havoc has amply demonstrated how devious and dishonest your RCC sources are. Let the "Lurker" compare websites and information and decide for themselves - bearing in mind the motives of each - and I believe the evidence is clear - you and pegleg LOSE, SD. (Sorry for the shouting, NOT -:)
BAPTIST HISTORY
"We do not intend that...all whom the Catholics or Protestants termed heretics were necessarily sound Baptists. However...from among those groups thus stigmatized are ...found our Baptist forefathers and they are a scarlet cord of witness for Christ." (Three Witnesses for the Baptists, Curtis Pugh, 1974)
"...anabaptism is...as contrary as can be to the doctrine of Christ and His Apostles:truly it is no marvel that the obstinate Anabaptists are kept under and punished by common laws...In the time that Decius and Gallus Caesar were Emperors, there arose a question in the parts of Africa of rebaptising heretics; and St. Cyprian, and the rest of the Bishops, being assembled together in the Council of Carthage, liked well of anabaptism...Against the Donatists St. Augustine, with other learned men, disputed. There is also an Imperial Law made by Honorius and Theodosius, that holy Baptism should not be iterated. Justinian Caesar hath published the same, in Cod. lib. I. Tit. 6, in these words. ‘If any Minister of the Catholic Church be detected to have rebaptised any, let both him which committed the unappeasable offence, (if at least by age he be punishable) and he, also, that is won and persuaded thereunto, suffer punishment of death." (Heinrich, or Henry Bullinger, 1504-1575, Protestant Swiss reformer that first aided then succeeded Zwingli, Sermons on the Sacraments, London 1811, p 186, 187, 189)
Decius, about 201-251 A.D., the first Roman Emperor to launch organized persecution against the Christians. (J.D. Douglas, et al, The Concise Dictionary of the Christian Tradition, Grand Rapids, 1989, p 119)
Bullinger testifies that as early as the Third Century A.D. the apostate church opposed the anabaptists!
Gallus Caesar (Gallerius), about 201-311 A.D., was probably responsible for initiating the persecution against Christians in 303. (Ibid, p 162)
Persecution by Decius failed to destroy anabaptism! According to Bullinger, anabaptists were still present, in Africa at least, into the Fourth Century!
Justinian Caesar, 483-565 A.D., was Roman Emperor from 527. He established many churches and monasteries. (Ibid, p 213)
Bullinger reveals that the apostate churches had joined with imperial Rome in the Sixth Century in outlawing anabaptism as a capital offense - proof of the pre-Reformation existence of persons outside of the state church that were holding Baptist views.
Bullinger is quoted as saying, "The Anabaptists think themselves to be the only true church of Christ and acceptable to God and teach that they who by baptism are received into their churches ought not to have any communion with evangelical or any other, whatsoever, for that our churches are not true churches any more than the Papists." (Graves, Old Landmarkism, 1881. P 115)
Ulrich (or Huldrych) Zwingli, 1484-1531, Swiss Reformer. Under his leadership, the Zurich City Council "...took the drastic step of decreeing death by drowning as the penalty for all those who persisted in the heresy" (of anabaptism). (G.W. Bromiley, The Library of Christian Classics, Vol XXIV p 120)
Zwingli is quoted as saying, "The institution of Anabaptism is no novelty, but for thirteen hundred years has caused great disturbance in the church, and has acquired such a strength that the attempt in this age to contend with it appears futile for a time." (John T. Christian, A History of the Baptists, 1922, Vol 1, p5-6.)
Zwingli also places Baptists in the Third Century, near the time when some apostate congregations began mixing Old Testament priesthood ideas with paganism under Christian names to form what is now known as the Catholic church. (The Christian Church, the Church of God of the Scriptures, in existence at that time was Baptist.) He testifies to the faithfulness of our Baptist forefathers in opposing the wicked innovations of Apostate Rome.
You either did not read very much of the site:
http://www.users.aol.com/libcfl/libc.htm
Or, you were intentionally trying to mislead or deceive (no RC would do that - would they?). Lurkers,(and others) check out the site for yourselves.
The site is that of the Landmark Independent Baptist Church of Archer, FL. The only reference to Calvinism relates to Sovereign Grace (Eph 1:4-5) which has always existed - long before Calvin.
Anyone that might think Baptists would accept or agree to "infant baptism" is truly ignorant. Thousands of baptists (anabaptists and other baptists by other names) have been martyred for resisting this heresy. Independent Baptists believe in Scriptural baptism of Believers, as did ALL early Christians, and NOT infant baptism. This website clearly explains why.
This website is also a source for describing the New Testament Church that was founded by Jesus and exists today. This is the church of God from which apostate Baptists with the error of infant baptism began the Roman Catholic Church beginning about 250 A.D.
I am certain "IMRight" (LOL) is aware of this.
Once again (as always), you affirm that you are still a "post!"
TRUTH slides past you without recognition like water off of a duck's back. That is really sad.
What was all that gibberish you posted about? I could not recognize a response to anything that I have posted - although you addressed it to me. Don't bother trying to rephrase it.
Regarding your feigned failure to understand why baptists and other fundamentalists did not attend the Church Councils called by the Roman Emperor, perhaps you shoud re-read Matthew 22:21 ("...render unto Caesar...) in context to see what Jesus says - but you know that - you just choose to ignore it as does your RC church(sic).
Since your Catholic(sic) sect did not exist in the First Century when the New Testament was written, how can you possibly claim "your church wrote the NT?"
In view of 2 Tim 3:16-17, and 2 Pet 1:20-21 your claim borders on blasphemy!
And, the aversion to prophetic docs seems currently to be unalterably terminal.
2 things. . .
1) IF you would like to consider the better such I run across, send me a private message and I'll make up a list of such folk to send such docs back to privately. . . either via FR private email or other private emails per your choice.
2) Am personally praying that IF AND WHEN such sensibilities matter to God, that He would cause such individuals to have their own dreams, visions which came true frequently or dramatically enough until they eagerly sought God out and humbled themselves before Him seeking WHATEVER HE WANTED in their lives. Perhaps you'd care to join in such a prayer.
Blessings, . . . been interesting!
I wonder if any attitudes will change if any such as have been posted come startlingly true.
And, the aversion to prophetic docs seems currently to be unalterably terminal.
2 things. . .
1) IF you would like to consider the better such I run across, send me a private message and I'll make up a list of such folk to send such docs back to privately. . . either via FR private email or other private emails per your choice.
2) Am personally praying that IF AND WHEN such sensibilities matter to God, that He would cause such individuals to have their own dreams, visions which came true frequently or dramatically enough until they eagerly sought God out and humbled themselves before Him seeking WHATEVER HE WANTED in their lives. Perhaps you'd care to join in such a prayer.
Blessings, . . . been interesting!
I wonder if any attitudes will change if any such as have been posted come startlingly true.
And, the aversion to prophetic docs seems currently to be unalterably terminal.
2 things. . .
1) IF you would like to consider the better such I run across, send me a private message and I'll make up a list of such folk to send such docs back to privately. . . either via FR private email or other private emails per your choice.
2) Am personally praying that IF AND WHEN such sensibilities matter to God, that He would cause such individuals to have their own dreams, visions which came true frequently or dramatically enough until they eagerly sought God out and humbled themselves before Him seeking WHATEVER HE WANTED in their lives. Perhaps you'd care to join in such a prayer.
Blessings, . . . been interesting!
I wonder if any attitudes will change if any such as have been posted come startlingly true.